The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has asked a Federal High Court in Abuja to dismiss a suit filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) against President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.<\/p>\n
The PDP and Dino Melaye, a chieftain of the party, had filed an order of mandamus to compel the NDLEA to arrest and prosecute Tinubu over an alleged forfeiture of funds relating to narcotics trafficking in the US.<\/p>\n
In a preliminary objection filed on Wednesday, Joseph Sunday, director of prosecution of the NDLEA, said the application by the PDP and Melaye is \u201cincompetent\u201d and that the court lacks the jurisdiction to entertain it.<\/p>\n
The anti-narcotics agency said the suit by the opposition party should be struck out because it is \u201cpolitical in nature\u201d, adding that it is not in the interest of Nigerians.<\/p>\n
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\nThe NDLEA said the suit was targeted at removing Tinubu as a bonafide candidate in the February 25 presidential election.<\/p>\n
The agency argued that an order of mandamus is an equitable remedy and should only be applied in good faith and should not produce an indirect or underlying result.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe doctrine of judicial self-restraint precludes this honourable court from delving into matters with political colouration or matters aimed at getting direct or indirect political goals,\u201d the suit reads.<\/p>\n
In an affidavit supporting the preliminary objection, Chia Depunn, a litigation officer attached to the NDLEA directorate of prosecution, said the agency has a \u201chealthy relationship\u201d with the US government, and that Tinubu\u2019s name has \u201cnever featured in the exchanges\u201d in a drug case between the two countries.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe NDLEA has a healthy relationship with the government of the United States of America, the name of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu by whatever acronyms or combination of names has never featured in the exchanges we had with the United States of America,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He said the name of Tinubu \u201chas also not featured in the radar and database of the agency as a person arrested, investigated or prosecuted in connection with drug or other related offences\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat this suit as presently constituted does not confer the court with jurisdiction. That the 1st Applicant does not have Locus Standi to institute this suit as it does not possess interest peculiar to it and above the interests of all other Nigerians,\u201d the affidavit reads.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat the suit is baseless, frivolous and brought in bad faith with the sole aim of achieving a political objective using the instrumentality of the court process. That the facts and circumstances of the case require the court to apply the doctrine of judicial self-restraint.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat the Order of Mandamus must be applied in good faith to promote the public interest. That the Order of Mandamus should not produce an indirect or underlying result.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat the suit was not a criminal indictment or charge. That the standard of proof in civil forfeiture is based on the balance of probabilities. That the standard of proof in a criminal indictment, charges and proceedings is proof beyond a reasonable doubt. That the burden of proof in criminal procedure is much higher than that of civil procedure.\u201d<\/p>\n
The NDLEA said the application by the PDP is \u201cdead and legally unsustainable\u201d, adding that the court should \u201cdismiss this suit with substantial cost\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has asked a Federal High Court in Abuja to dismiss a suit filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) against President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu. The PDP and Dino Melaye, a chieftain of the party, had filed an order of mandamus to compel the NDLEA to arrest and prosecute […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1272,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1271","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1271","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1271"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1271\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1273,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1271\/revisions\/1273"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1272"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1271"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1271"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1271"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}